As we prepare to put 2017 in the rear-view mirror, we’re taking a look back at the most popular “Whatever Happened to…?” stories that ran this year.

The list of most-read columns includes five restaurants (or restaurant-bars), one nightclub, two stores, an ice cream/dairy and one Seabreeze ride. The most popular stories were:

10. EMPIRE BREWING CO.

The brewpub-restaurant helped kickstart Rochester’s fledgling High Falls entertainment district when it debuted in 1997. The place was an immediate hit; lots of customers stopped by before or after visiting nearby Frontier Field, which opened to baseball that year and to pro soccer the year before. Empire had award-winning beers and an “upscale” menu of food before it abruptly closed its High Falls business in 2003 because of financial problems. An economic downturn led to companies cutting back on entertaining expenses, which cut deeply into Empire’s business, according to one of the owners. The Syracuse version closed soon after.

9. ANNIS DAIRY

The Annis family served up “ice cream that made Avon famous” from its Livingston County dairy for decades. The dairy began in 1930 and the ice cream shop on West Henrietta Road started in the 1960s. The business — which also sold milk and other items — included another shop in Scottsville and Annis Dairy ice cream also was available in select restaurants. By 1989, news came out that Upstate Milk Cooperative of Le Roy, Genesee County, had signed an agreement to purchase Annis Dairy. The sale included Annis’ equipment, delivery routes and Avon milk plant but not the dairy stores or ice cream business. After owner Howard Annis died in 1996, one of his daughters ran the Avon shop for several more years before it closed for good.

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From the Archive: Howard Annis, owner of VH Annis Dairy, was selling its Avon Milk Plant and six wholesale milk routes and delivery trucks to giant upstate milk cooperatives inc. He would keep the dairy stores in Avon, Perry and Scottsville. (May 1989.)(Photo: File photo)

The longtime Pittsford restaurant was known for fine dining and dancing, a place where former high school classmates met for holiday-time reunions and where business was bustling during golf tournaments at nearby Oak Hill Country Club. The business origins date back to the late 1800s. The Maplewood Inn was sold in 1998 and new owners renovated the interior and reopened the place as Hawthorne’s. Another restaurant, the Back Nine Grill, is now at the site. The Maplewood Inn is long gone, but at least the site remains in the food service business, as it has for more than a century.

The business started during the television industry’s nascent years and grew to become the biggest TV dealer and TV-service shop in the Rochester area. Located for years on North Winton Road near Blossom Road, Hill TV became well-known for its low-key, folksy ads that ran nonstop on the television airwaves. Hill TV later opened additional shops on West Ridge Road in Greece and Jefferson Road in Henrietta before closing in 1989.

Housed in a historic landmark in Penfield, the Yellow Rose Café was a popular restaurant where plenty of romances were kindled and/or escalated and a place with a reputation for being haunted. The funky décor included seats cut from tree trunks with the bark intact and stained-glass windows. John Rebis opened the Yellow Rose in the former home of community founder Daniel Penfield in 1978 and ran the place, for the most part, until it closed in the early 1990s.

5. ZAB’S BACKYARD HOTS

Brothers Don and Mike Zabkar started the Rochester-area-based restaurant chain with plans to bring hot dogs to the masses the way that McDonald’s did with hamburgers. Zab’s featured charcoal-broiled foot-long hot dogs and a slew of toppings that included the company’s signature spicy hot sauce. The first shop opened in Henrietta in 1981 and the business later added outlets throughout Monroe County. The company launched a vast expansion plan before filing for bankruptcy protection. The last surviving Zab’s, on Park Avenue, was gone by the mid-1990s.

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Zab's Backyard Hots, Inc., 1986.(Photo: File photo)

4. ORANGE MONKEY

A live-music club in Henrietta that mainly catered to the heavy metal-hard rock crowd, the Orange Monkey was a place where pyrotechnics, peccadillos and puffy hair were the norm. Local bands like Pearl and Cheater were favorites at the Monkey and future Rock and Roller Hall of Famers Cheap Trick once played there. Former customers posted Facebook memories about rock-and-roll shenanigans and a longtime bartender said the place “got rowdy sometimes.” The “Monkey” opened on Jefferson Road in 1971 and closed in 1983.

Sibley’s was the grand dame of Rochester’s downtown department stores, and a visit to its Toyland was an annual part of many holiday traditions. Toyland featured gala displays and offerings — like trombone-shaped kazoos, giant toy soldiers and trains — during the holidays. The Magic Corridor, which came later, took children through a dark tunnel lined with animated characters portraying various Christmas stories. That all ended when Sibley’s stores closed in 1990.

Run by the Lew family, Cathay Pagoda was one of the earliest and longest-running Chinese restaurants in Rochester. The restaurant was in a huge, historic building at 488 E. Main St. and had several dining rooms and notable architecture and stayed open later than most restaurants. Guests entered through a hand-carved “dragon” teakwood door and the interior included the Pagoda Room and the Bamboo Room. Cathay Pagoda opened in 1968 and closed in 2007.

From the Archive: A Dec. 30, 1981, clipping of Cathay Pagoda.(Photo: DemocratandChronicle.Newspapers.com)

1. THE GYROSPHERE

Designed by Seabreeze Amusement Park workers as a “rock-and-roll experience on a ride,” the Gyrosphere was, essentially, the Octopus-armed Scrambler ride inside a dome accompanied by a spectacular sound and light show. “Psychedelic” images flashed on the walls while loud music — for a long time, it was “Fire on High” by ELO — cranked over enormous speakers

The Gyrosphere was once a much-loved ride that was at Seabreeze Amusement Park.(Photo: Courtesy of Seabreeze)